Plasters on Both Knees
by bare-footed-muse
Summary: A series of drabbles about the trials and tribulations of growing up in Arendelle, the Southern Isles and the Valley of the Living Rock. Set before the film or in those 13 years of closed doors.
1. Anna, 14, Elsa, 17

**Notes:**

A series of drabbles about the trials and tribulations of growing up.

There's no particular order or through narrative to these; I won't be updating on a regular basis, but just kind of as and when I'm inspired. Any suggestions or anything, let me know!

BFM x

* * *

 **Anna, 14**

 **Elsa, 17**

Anna hurried down the corridor, hands covered in blood.

The mortal dye stained her face, ran over her fingers in rivulets, spotted the front of her dress.

"Nonononono –"

It looked like some grizzly murder scene – but the Princess of Arendelle was just having _another_ nosebleed.

She looked desperately around for something to stem the flow, but everything she could see was either an antique, an heirloom, or silk.

She'd just been sitting in the library, reading, when the first traitorous drop on her dress had alerted her to the situation. There had been nothing there except _armrest_ covers, and the maid had shrieked as she'd gone for one of them – so here she was, head tipped back, trying desperately not to bleed everywhere in search of a handkerchief. Or two.

Rounding a corner, her head was tipped so far back that she didn't see her sister until they collided.

Elsa reeled backwards at the touch, as though afraid of catching something – then she saw the blood and her eyes widened and her voice shot up hysterically.

"Oh Christ, Anna! _Anna_!"

"Nononono, nosebleed, nosebleed!" Anna desperately waved the hand about that wasn't clamped over her nostrils. "Don't worry!"

Hearing this, Elsa visibly relaxed for a second. Then she tensed up again.

There was an awkward pause.

"Um. I'm looking for a handkerchief."

"Oh," Elsa's eyes widened, but her rigid stance did not slacken. "Of course. Sorry. Hang on."

The tall, pale sister who seemed almost like a ghost to Anna quickly turned and walked to the outside apex of the corridor's sharp corner. She seemed to be busying herself at the little table there – Anna couldn't help but glance about – it was bizarre – more than bizarre, amazing – to just bump into her sister like this, in the halls of the castle – she wanted to stand – talk – but there was the very pressing issue of the steady _drip drip_ from her nose onto one of her favourite dresses that had to be dealt with.

"Here," Elsa had quickly turned around to face her again, and was holding out two handkerchiefs: one neatly folded and the other wrapped around some kind of cube.

Anna grabbed them and gratefully wadded up the first handkerchief under her nose. The other was cold to the touch, and as Anna saw water bleeding through the fabric, she realised it was wrapped around an ice cube. She gratefully applied it to the bridge of her nose.

Muffled through the fabric: "Where did you get – well, thank you, Elsa, God, I – "

But her sister had already started to walk away down the corridor.

"Hey! Elsa! Wait!"

This absent sister did not turn.

Anna was faintly annoyed, but with both hands clutching handkerchiefs to her face, she was in no position to show this.

"Well… thanks. I guess."

As Anna watched the retreating figure of her sister, ice already stemming the flow of blood, she was confused.


	2. Kristoff, 9

**Kristoff, 9**

"Hush, baby, hush, now," Bulda rocked her son gently back and forth, cooing. "It's ok…"

"It's not f-f-fair!" The child wailed. "It was the biggest block I'd ever cut!"

"I know baby, I know."

The Trolls were huddled as a mass: when one of their number felt pain, they all shared in the experience, comforting as one. The little human child rescued by Bulda was not a part of their great, interconnected web of feeling, but he was family, and they were still sensitive to his emotions, and still felt his grief. They all rocked back and forth with Bulda.

"I hate people! I hate them!"

Bulda wiped tears and snot from her son's face with weathered hands. "Now listen, Kristoff, we've talked about this. Not all people are the same."

"They are! You don't know them!" He wailed, eyes leaking and tears spilling over again. "They steal and cheat and are mean and I hate them! I wish I was a Troll!"

"Oh, baby," Bulda pulled him close again, and the congregation hummed and murmured as one, sympathy whispering on the air. "You are family. You are one of us."

Kristoff shook his head, all nine years of him tremulous in misery. His face was buried in his mother's tunic. The mossy, earthy smell was a comfort to him, but it did nothing to stop him feeling _different_. Not quite the same. "No I'm not," he mumbled.

Bulda showered the top of his head with kisses. A few other tiny Trolls had broken out into sympathy tears and rolled over, wrapping tiny hugs around Kristoff's legs and arms and back.

"You are one of us, Kristoff. Don't you worry a bit about what people say. You're one of us."


	3. Anna, 6, Elsa, 9

**Anna, 6**

 **Elsa, 9**

There was the slither of paper across polished wood, and Elsa looked up from her brooding to see drawing slip under her door. She heard the patter of feet as the secret artist ran down the corridor as fast as her legs would carry her.

Elsa paused for a moment, waiting until the footsteps had well and truly died away, before leaping up and scrambling over to the door. She picked up the drawing.

The sky was a blue strip along the top of the paper, and the family of ducks in the middle were painstakingly detailed. Elsa could see where her sister had started to draw feathers on one and got bored. Beside the ducks, with very triangular bodies (but very round hands, heads and feet) were two figures. Lots of mismatched ovals seemed to be pouring from the hands, and it took Elsa a good minute to work out that this was bread – they were feeding the ducks.

She could tell, by the colour of the hair (and the labels Anna had helpfully added) who the two figures were meant to be.

Elsa padded over to her desk and opened one of the meticulously organised drawers. She produced a pencil, and plonked herself down on the floor. In careful lettering, she began to write on the back of the drawing.

 _This is really good Anna. I like the colers and the ducks look happy. Thank you! ! !_

Elsa drew a smiling face.

 _Try and make you're arms the same lenth though, becuase arms are the same lenth in real life. xxxxxx Elsa xxxxxx_

The 'x's almost covered the page.

Hopping up, she cast a longing look at the closed door before walking back to the desk and pulling open the bottom drawer. Inside was a pile of drawings, all in the same detailed, blocky style as the duck picture and all annotated in Elsa's neat handwriting and covered with 'x's.

She placed the latest picture carefully on the top and shut the drawer with a sad sigh.


	4. Anna, 15, Elsa, 18

**Anna, 15**

 **Elsa, 18**

Back against the door and legs spread out before her, Anna sang quietly to herself.

"Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me…"

She took a chocolate from the box beside her.

"This truffles are amazing, Elsa. I don't know where papa got them from, but really, they are…"

She picked up the box and examined it to for any hints about its origin.

"Ok, so there's some writing on the bottom, but…" she squinted, frowned, turned her head. "But I can't read it. It's waaaay too swirly. And – ohh," Anna rotated the box. "…aaand I was trying to read it upside down. So I think it says 'Belgium' ? To be honest, I had a geography lesson _yesterday_ and I still have no idea where that is, so…"

Anna trailed off and heaved an enormous sigh. Her head rested back against the wood of the door.

There was a point at the bottom which had been repainted far more than the rest of it, due entirely to the hours Anna had spent pressed up against it.

"Elsa… are you even in there?"

No answer.

"All you have to do is… wish me a happy birthday. I don't even care that you haven't got me anything. It would… just be nice to know you're there."

No answer.

A beat.

Anna scrambled to her feet and left without a word.

Trapped on the other side of the door, Elsa listened carefully to the retreating footsteps. She wanted so much to turn the handle, call after her a 'happy birthday' – but her father, she knew, would be angry. Because Anna would talk. Anna would tell mama and papa over dinner how _exciting_ it was to see her sister today.

She knew she mustn't get too close to Anna because Anna would get hurt.

So there was no happy birthday.

But it was ok – Anna would come back tomorrow, and tell her about her day.

But the next day came and went, and all Elsa heard was the pause of footfalls outside her door.

Not a word.


	5. Kristoff, 15

**Kristoff, 15**

Kristoff was not, habitually, a proud boy. But he was incredibly pleased with his 'beard' and its associated celebrity.

None of the Trolls had beards – being stone, the only kind of hair they had was oddly grass-like and growing atop their heads. The children in particular were fascinated.

"It's all prickly!"

"How fast does it grow?"

"Why's it a different colour to your hair?"

It was rare to go five minutes without having a little four-fingered hand reach up and rub his face. Trolls did not understand personal space.

There was one downside to the beard, however, and that was the increasing amount of comments the ice harvesters made regarding him and Sven

"Eh lad, fine beard. You an' reindeer are becoming more alike every day."

"Boy to man! Won't be able to tell you two apart soon."

"Becomin' indistinguishable!"

After about two weeks of proud beard growth, Kristoff finally decided that the exponentially increasing amount of 'you and Sven have become one' comments outweighed the man points of sporting a beard, and made his way into Arendelle's town centre. He stopped to buy a very basic cut-throat razor and got a room at one of the local inns.

In front of the very small mirror the room afforded, Kristoff examined his beard with a shrewd eye.

You probably started at the top, right?

He shmushed his mouth to the side and placed the razor just below his cheekbone, pulling

downwards.

It felt like someone was scraping off his skin.

"Ow! Jesus!"

Eyes watering, he squinted back in the mirror. The skin looked slightly red, but other than that there was no damage. Was it supposed to hurt that much?

He pulled himself together and tried again. It was no better.

After twenty minutes of stinging, swearing and a fair bit of blood, he was done.

Kristoff looked in the mirror. The side of his face he's started with was bright red, a rash spreading across it and a few bright beads of blood at the trickier points where he'd nicked the skin. His face felt like it was on fire, itching and stinging and burning like nothing he'd ever felt before. He didn't want to touch it it was so sore, and he didn't have any ice – he'd sold it all – to try and soothe it. There was no water, and he felt like crying.

Two days later, the rash was far less red, but still very visible. The cuts had turned to scabs and he looked a mess. He'd gone up to the ice fields and the older harvesters laughed themselves silly at him. The flush of embarrassment added to the crimson mess of his face and he'd never felt more humiliated in his life.

Later, one of the older harvesters took him aside.

"How'd you do that, lad?"

Kristoff shrugged, busying himself with Sven's harvest, not making eye contact. "Shaving."

"Did y'shave with an ice saw?"

Kristoff flushed further and made a non-committal kind of grunt.

"Listen lad, you got t'use shaving cream, y'hear? Water and shaving cream. Get it all over y'beard and _then_ use the razor. Dry shavin'll wreck y'face. Think you learnt that already, huh?"

Ice harvesters didn't talk much. When they did talk, it wasn't about family, and though this older harvester didn't know anything about specific Kristoff's living situation, he'd been working the fields long enough to have seen him as a kid, running around with his reindeer and doing everything he could to work like the others. It was a fairly safe bet that this kid had no family; certainly no father that would have taught him the right of passage that was shaving a beard.

The next time Kristoff arrived clean-shaven, the harvester was pleased to see it was with far less cuts and scars than last time.


End file.
